"Solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short" are Hobbes' words for life without society. Who should we thank for our current state of comparative wealth? Our ancestors, who left us two great gifts:

Capital- accumulated savings, which they could have consumed and thereby lived (momentarily) better. Instead, they refrained from slaughtering the cattle, eating the seed corn, and burning all the wood. The resources they set aside, generation after generation, have let us build machines that vastly increase our productivity. Investments from the past give us our luxuries today.

Knowledge- ideas, shared freely with one another. Beginning with language and continuing with the arts and sciences, our parents discovered and recorded and taught us the concepts that enrich our lives beyond measure.

But now, in the very present, what are we preparing to bequeath to our posterity? Savings rates are negative in much of the world, as speculators cash in on recent (apparent) capital gains and spend spend spend. New ideas are increasingly held in secret, as proprietary knowledge for profit. Learning in the schools is in crisis, as children waste their time on entertainment and consumption.

Adam Smith observed that all the activities of governments had not been able to destroy capital so fast as individuals efforts had built it up. The balance may have tipped; we may be at a turning point. Our descendants may look back at our inherited wealth and ask why we chose to squander it. How can we answer them?